Kumail Nanjiani

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Emily V. Gordon and Kumail Nanjiani on the red carpet at the 90th Annual Academy Awards (Oscars) 2018 held at the Dolby Theater in Hollywood. This year's winner of Best Picture was 'The Shape of Water', with director Guillermo del Toro winning Best Achievement in Directing - Los Angeles, California, United States - Sunday 4th March 2018

Kumail Nanjiani at the 33rd Annual Film Independent Spirit Awards held at Santa Monica Pier. This year's winner for Best Feature was 'Get Out', with Jordan Peele taking home Best Director. Timothée Chalamet and Frances McDormand won Best Male and Female Lead for 'Call Me by Your Name' and 'Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri' respectively - Santa Monica, California, United States - Saturday 3rd March 2018

Emily V. Gordon and Kumail Nanjiani at the 2018 Writers Guild Foundation's 'Beyond Words' event held at the Writers Guild Theater in Los Angeles. With award season about to get in full swing, Academy Award-nominated screenwriters discuss the movies of the year - Beverly Hills, California, United States - Friday 2nd February 2018

Emily V. Gordon and Kumail Nanjiani at the world premiere of Marvel Studios' 'Black Panther', held at the Dolby Theatre in Los Angeles. The movie is the second to feature Chadwick Boseman as the titular superhero, following 2016's 'Captain America: Civil War' - Los Angeles, California, United States - Tuesday 30th January 2018

Calling emergency services when it turns out there's no real emergency is one of the most embarrassing things that can happen to a person - but it certainly informed some great comedy for comedian Kumail Nanjiani, who spoke about his experience on 'The Ellen Show' this week.

Kumail Nanjiani and Emily V. Gordon at the BAFTA Los Angeles tea party

The 'Silicon Valley' star, who last year wrote and appeared in his semi-autobiographical film 'The Big Sick' last year, talks about how sometimes moments with his wife and writing partner Emily V. Gordon helps him write jokes. He opens up about one exchange in particular that took place at 4am recently.

It may be rather long for a romantic comedy, but this film has such a strikingly original script that it grabs hold and never lets go. Based on the real-life story of actor-writer Kumail Nanjiani (Silicon Valley) and his cowriter wife Emily Gordon, the movie is packed with engaging characters who each take their own journey through a series of unexpected events. In other words, it's a clever screenplay that's beautifully played and often very, very funny.

Playing an only slightly fictionalised version of himself, Kumail is a stand-up comic in Chicago when he meets Emily (Zoe Kazan), who heckles him at one of his gigs. Their banter quickly turns to flirtation and then love. But there's a hitch in the fact that Kumail's parents (Anupan Kher and Zenobia Sfiroff) expect him to marry a nice Pakistani Muslim girl, and he doesn't want to let them down. He's even reluctant to reveal Emily to his slightly more open-minded brother (Adeel Akhtar). This strains the burgeoning romance, which takes a turn when Emily is put into an induced coma in hospital. It also forces Kumail to get to know Emily's parents (Holly Hunter and Ray Romano), who turn up to sit with him as they wait for her condition to improve.

It's rare for a rom-com to take such a serious turn, and this film plays the situation with a proper sense of dramatic tension while maintaining an awkwardly edgy comical sensibility. All of this allows characters to come to vivid life, each with his or her own big issues that need to be dealt with as they interact with other people. The network of relationships reflect real life better than most movies, exploring Kumail's professional life and his camaraderie with his fellow comics as well as the layered family bonds and his developing connection with Emily and her parents. It's also a refreshingly realistic depiction of multi-cultural society.

When Kumail and Emily meet, they're instantly drawn toward one another. Emily is a student and Kumail is an aspiring comedian who also works part time as an Uber driver to make money. After spending the night together, Emily awakes and decides to make an early exist only to ring an Uber and for Kumail to, obviously, be the nearest driver.

As the pair become more and more endeared to one another they spend more time together and things look like they could get more serious but for Kumail, things aren't quiet as straight forward boy meets girl, boy and girl fall in love and marry. Being Muslim from a Pakistani background, Kumail's parents expect him to have an arranged marriage and as he grows older his mother becomes more and more obsessed with finding the right person to share his life with.

Kumail can no longer keep his new Beau secret and confides in his brother that he's been dating a white girl and his reaction isn't exactly as positive as he might've hoped. When Emily finds out about the plans for Kumail's arranged marriage, the pair have a talk and, even though in their heart of hearts neither want to, they break their relationship up.

Lloyd is a young ninja still in high school who is trained alongside five other martial arts experts named Jay, Kai, Cole, Zane and Nya by the master warrior Master Wu. While by day they are faced with the evils of teenage life, by night they are death-defying heroes whose job it is to take down all manner of enemies with the help of a few state-of-the-art machines. They and the people of their island Ninjago face a terrible threat in the form of the war-mongering villain Garmadon - who also happens to be Lloyd's father. It's safe to say their relationship is a tense one. He wants revenge on Wu, who is actually Lloyd's uncle, but for what we are yet to discover...

Since the loss of her mother, Doris hasn't really had much companionship. She has her best friend and work colleagues but love has always been something that's alluded her. She once had an offer of marriage but knowing that this would separate her from her mother, she declined.

After meeting the new director of art at her place of work, Doris automatically feels a connection with him. Sure, John might be a few years her junior and into very different things to herself, but Doris has a niggling feeling she can't leave alone. Doris might be a little bookish and bespectacled but she decides to explore new methods to attract her man.

Along the way Doris befriends some of John's friends, who at first might seem entirely different to Doris but in actuality have a lot of similarities. Doris must find a way to balance her new and old friends and also win her man. Hello, My Name is Doris actually started out as an eight minute short called Doris and the Intern, written and directed by Laura Terruso. Director Michael Showalter instantly saw the potential in the initial footage and started work on a large scale version of the film.

Although it presents itself as a rude sex comedy, this movie is actually a prudish exercise in simplistic moralising. A glut of sweary dialog and leery innuendo is certainly no replacement for properly adult-oriented humour. At least Cameron Diaz and Jason Segel are relatively reliable as actors who can keep their characters likeable, but even they struggle with the trite material. And as a cowriter, Segel only has himself to blame.

Diaz and Segel play Annie and Jay, a couple whose courtship consisted mainly of having lots of sex in as many unusual places as they could think of. So it's hardly surprising that marriage and parenthood feel like a disappointment. They never have time for sex now, so when Annie's blog improbably wins a lucrative publishing deal, they celebrate by leaving the kids with the grandparents for a sexy night on their own. To get things going, they decide to film themselves on their iPad, oblivious to the fact that the video is synchronised to all of the iPads they've given to their family, friends and clients over the last few months. So now they're in a mad dash to find them all and delete their sex tape.

Honestly, does anyone actually give iPads to everyone they know? This is such a naggingly stupid premise that it leaves everything that happens feeling utterly inane, especially their contrived ignorance about how the Cloud works. Diaz and Segel bring enough charm to the film to keep the audience watching, playing even the lamest jokes as if they're hilarious. And as they race between their friends and family members, each side actor gets their cameo-style moment in which they can try to steal the show. Although even here director Jake Kasdan (Bad Teacher) hedges away from the genuine gross-out comedy, which leaves first-rate comical performers like Corddry, Lowe and Black looking a bit lost.

Vanessa and Jack are a loved up couple expecting their first child, with dreams of fixing up a dilapidated old house in New Orleans neighbourhood. Little do they know of the house's history and just why it hasn't been inhabited for so many years, but they are about to find it. A visit from their rather unconstructive new neighbour F'Resnel tells them that the building is nicknamed Maison de Sang - in English, House of Blood. Strange things begin to happen to the couple, with Vanessa displaying some extremely odd and disturbing behaviour leaving Jack with no choice but to call upon her psychiatrist and her sister Marjorie to help him find out what appears to be possessing her. Meanwhile, two exorcists from the Vatican are called to the house to do their own research into the demonic presence.

Joe Toy is struggling under the weight of his over-bearing single father Frank; his rules, curfews and sanctions are suffocating him as his independence is slowly quashed day by day during his summer vacation. In a bid for the first taste of freedom in his life, he grabs his best friend Patrick Keenan, an equally suppressed teenage boy, and takes him on a trip to the woods where he shows him where they will build their own house free from any kind of parental strain. Tagging along is a weird and unpredictable kid named Biaggio who they're too afraid to reject, and who thinks up an idea of a kidnapping to explain their dramatic runaway to their worried parents. While they struggle to live off the land and take care of themselves, their friendships are tested as they discover just how difficult it is to be independent, parents or no parents.

Joe Toy is not so different from your average hormone-ravaged adolescent boy; he, like many teenagers, struggles with his limits of independence as his father Frank, who brings Joe up alone, insists on keeping control over Joe's life as he tries in vain to gain a little freedom. In a bid for autonomy and liberation, he enlists the help of his best friend Patrick Keenan and their peculiar acquaintance Biaggio to help him build a home in the woods during their summer vacation and thus become entirely self-sufficient, living off the land. However, tempers rise and friendships are put to the test as they discover that true independence is almost impossible as even the kind of family you choose becomes just as restricting as the one you were born with.

Joe Toy is not so different from your average hormone-ravaged adolescent boy; he, like many teenagers, struggles with his limits of independence as his father Frank, who brings Joe up alone, insists on keeping control over Joe's life as he tries in vain to gain a little freedom. In a bid for autonomy and liberation, he enlists the help of his best friend Patrick Keenan and their peculiar acquaintance Biaggio to help him build a home in the woods during their summer vacation and thus become entirely self-sufficient, living off the land. However, tempers rise and friendships are put to the test as they discover that true independence is almost impossible as even the kind of family you choose becomes just as restricting as the one you were born with.